


Krawatte

by CyanideBreathmint



Series: even honey bees [1]
Category: Ghost in the Shell (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Food Porn, Gen, Spoilers, Suit Porn, lbr that is one helluva first day from hell, navel gazing extreme sport edition, sad robot boy in sad cyberpunk city, spoilers for episodes 15 23 24 25 26, they canonically get better, you can't give me a plot thread like this and then just abandon it guys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-19
Updated: 2021-01-19
Packaged: 2021-03-17 08:21:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28845984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CyanideBreathmint/pseuds/CyanideBreathmint
Summary: A day in the life of Section 9's most overqualified robot tank technician/daycare teacher, this fic is a meditation on life, sapience, death, and humanity in a dystopic world with AI spider tanks, bioroids, and full-conversion cyborgs.
Relationships: Batou & Tachikomas, Proto & Tachikomas
Series: even honey bees [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2123595
Comments: 8
Kudos: 8





	Krawatte

7:00 AM: Rise from bed. Proceed to perform morning ablutions and grooming.  
7:15 AM: Consume breakfast.  
7:30 AM: Leave home, begin walk to nearby subway station.  
7:35 AM: Arrive at subway station in time to wait for the 7:38AM northbound train.  
7:38 AM: Embark on train.  
7:50 AM: Disembark from train. Begin walk to Section 9 HQ.  
7:53 AM: Enter Section 9 HQ. Pass through security check.  
7:55 AM: Change into technician’s coveralls.  
8:00 AM: Clock in. 

Proto’s habits rarely vary. It’s not as though he has a need for them to vary. He rises and showers, dresses in civilian clothes, eats and heads to work. Operationally he knows it’s not a good idea to be too regular in his habits, and that explains the rare variances in his routine. But something catches in the corner of his mind, one morning, on the way to work. Are his breaks in routine too routine? 

He’s pressed up against other bodies in the crowded train car, some synthetic, some not. It does not bother him the same way it bothers some of the others he sees. It’s a common something, not really a facial expression, because some of the faces he looks into are as finely sculpted as his own, and much less mobile. No, it’s a twitch of the eyes, a flickering of the pupil from side to side. Embarrassment, he thinks, and shame, maybe? He doesn’t know. He chooses to bring up his external memory instead of dwelling on his fellow passengers’ discomfort, glances instantly at his routine for the past four weeks. 

No, he’s been perfectly stochastic in the way he spaces those careful deviations from schedule. It amuses him a little when he thinks about it. Androids don’t doubt. They follow their programming. No, it is humans who doubt. And Tachikomas. And him.

—

Proto likes his work at Section 9. It’s a perennial complaint everywhere that people are lazy and don’t want to work, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. People need structured activity to fill their time. Prolonged inactivity leads to depression and anxiety. It isn’t just a human need. Proto knows that working dogs of high intelligence get destructive if left unstimulated by work or play. Proto can’t really say he’s had destructive impulses when left alone without something to do. But he looks forward to the challenges that each day brings, even the tiny exasperations of dealing with the Tachikomas’ little disobediences. 

The reflection in a mirror is reversed horizontally instead of vertically because of the perceiver’s point of view. A reflection is photons being sent back the way they came, into the Z-axis of a three-dimensional space. Light reflects off a being looking into a mirror to generate the image, and bounces off the mirror’s reflective surface back the way it came. The reflection is, in a sense, a 3-D map of the viewer, turned inside-out like a discarded glove or sock.

Proto used to think he was a reflection of the Tachikomas, an inverse image of them. They’re built on the same core of artificial intelligence — the neurochip — but that’s where the similarities end. They are the most visible kind of Other, weapons of war in blocky blue bodies, with four wheeled legs and two manipulators. He, on the other hand, was sculpted to resemble a human male, a new Adam Kadmon made in a nascent God’s idealized image. Proto harbors no illusions about how he looks to others. He knows that humans find him attractive, with his long, pale hair and widow’s peak, his symmetrical, oval face and clean jawline. He knows this because he has met humans who have told him so.

Proto had spent a while wondering why he had to be beautiful, and had come to a tentative conclusion. They made him beautiful, because humans like to have beautiful things around them. There is no structural advantage to making a bowl or a desk aesthetically pleasing, only the value gained in beholding it, itself. That, he thinks, is why he looks the way he does. Pale hair, to contrast with the homogenous population of Japan, and light brown eyes to be different, striking, but still comfortably familiar. He had wondered similarly why they had given him a male body and identity, and come to a different conclusion. He had been given his gender identity because his creators had wanted the first bioroid to be unthreatening, and the team that had designed and created him was largely male. 

Some amount of deviation is exotic. Some variation is interesting. Too much digression from the mean, however, and the difference turns sinister. And that is why he no longer thinks of himself as a reflection of the Tachikomas. No, his nature is more akin to that of a photonegative, glimpsed in a glass, darkly. 

—

There’s a familiar flash of pink on the pale plastic of the diagnostic console. Proto recognizes it instantly. It’s a small paper-wrapped cardboard box emblazoned with the name and logo of a famous sweet shop in Mie Prefecture. He sighs inwardly. The Tachikomas have bribed the senior techs with sweets again, and that means they’ll take all kinds of liberties again today. It’s a natural behavior. Human children push boundaries, as they grow up, to learn their parents’ responses, and to learn how to interact with other humans. The Tachikomas, with their powerful, but inexperienced minds, are also practicing social behavior, not just with each other, but with the humans they work for. In that sense, they are children, learning the mores and values of the society that is raising them. 

Proto has never been a child. He was born full-formed, with the knowledge needed to function in human society already programmed into him. He is at once more sophisticated than the Tachikomas, but also stunted in comparison to them. In this he feels no jealousy or regret. It is what it is. Some humans never get to have childhoods due to war, or abusive parents. He thinks himself fortunate that his neurochip isn’t subject to chemical imbalances the way a human brain can be. 

“Good morning, Proto!” one of the Tachikomas chirps as he enters the hangar. It’s Batou’s favorite. Most people can’t tell the Tachikomas apart without checking their serial numbers. One has a pattern of scratches on its chassis from squeezing in a tight alleyway. It’s been repainted, but the scratches lie in shallow relief under that new layer of paint. Another one has a small, superficial dent in the cowling above one leg that hasn’t been buffed out yet. Proto has those differences memorized, the way a marine biologist can tell the different whales in a pod apart. 

“Good morning,” Proto says. The blue-armored tank wheels itself into the maintenance bay and waits, obligingly, for Proto to begin. “You’re first up today,” he says as he gathers his tools and plugs the diagnostic cables into ports concealed beneath its abdominal armor plating, which it retracts.

“I am! As Mr. Batou’s favorite, I have to set a good example!” That little exclamation is greeted with high-pitched cries of disagreement and derision coming from the eight other Tachikomas in the room. This particular Tachikoma seems to derive a little too much satisfaction from being Batou’s pet, and Proto feels an unspoken warmth at the fact that he does not hold that opinion alone. 

“All right,” Proto tells it, as it gestures (perhaps rudely) at the other Tachikomas with the grippers on the end of its manipulator arm, “settle down now. I’ve got to check you out.” 

It’s fiddly work, and meticulous work, the kind of task Proto was programmed to like. His thinking follows the same broad pathways most sentient life does. Seek pleasure, avoid pain. Therefore, he was programmed with preferences and aversions, which are a lot more convenient than dithering eternally over two equally desirable or undesirable paths by merit alone. And pain is always a valuable warning, because he, unlike wholly organic beings, cannot heal on his own. His synthetic tissues only regenerate after maintenance treatment. In that sense he is like the Tachikomas, who submit to his maintenance work and inspections to stay in good condition. 

“Hey, look at this!” Another Tachikoma says, tapping at a diagnostic console’s keys with its manipulator claws. It doesn’t have to. It’s also wired directly into the console via its interface plug. “I found a Top Secret file on the Individual Eleven on the National Police Agency’s file server!” 

“Really?” another asks, “Show us! Show us!” 

“I’m impressed that you found it, too!” The workshop begins to sound like an elementary school at recess, as all the other Tachikomas begin to crowd around the console to look at the file. They’re chatty, for tanks. But then most tanks don’t talk. 

Proto runs advanced diagnostics and checks joints for mud and sand that could damage their surfaces. He checks its wheel-feet and legs for excessive wear, and swaps various parts out, just in case, signing the new pieces out one by one as mandated by Section 9 regulations. He’s just finished changing barrels on its LMG when it pipes up again.

“I wish I could look at it too,” Batou’s favorite Tachikoma says, just a little sadly, while Proto checks the fit of the new barrel with the receiver with a field gauge. Screw up the headspacing, and the feed mechanism will rip off the ends of the casings on the cartridges instead of feeding them smoothly. That can lead to a jam, which can lead to a catastrophic mechanical failure if multiple rounds cook off while stuck in the barrel.

“Come on now,” Proto tells it as he adjusts the barrel, (and them, at the same time, they are both many and one), “you should know better than to dive into places like that without permission.” He wants to say more, but doesn’t, not with a supervisor looking over his shoulder at what he’s doing. Instead he focuses his attention on what his hands are doing. 

“Nothing on Earth can suppress their curiosity,” the senior-most tech says, from behind his diagnostic console. “If they encounter any inappropriate data, we’ll just delete it. Hardware maintenance is our top priority.” There’s the astringent fragrance of green tea cutting through the smell of solvents and grease, and the subtle sweetish smell of plastic heated and cooled repeatedly, a faint metallic tang. Snack-time has officially begun, and it isn’t even 9 AM yet. 

“You’re too soft on them, sir,” Proto says, knowing that his superiors aren’t truly listening to him. “I can’t believe you let them buy you off with pastry.” Akafuku mochi, if Proto knows his supervisors, and he does. Sweetened azuki bean paste wrapped around pounded glutinous rice is a popular treat here.

“Red lab coat,” one of the Tachikomas extemporizes, “eating red bean jam treats. The man with the sweet tooth was too sweet.” 

“That wasn’t very funny, you know,” Proto tells it, as the others laugh their soft childish laughs. There isn’t really a logical reason why he’s this strict with the Tachikomas. He knows that Major Kusanagi maintains oversight over the developments in their AI, and will — no, has acted in the past, to curb undesirable developments. 

“Sugar is such a human weakness,” one of the Tachikomas says, and Proto wants to sigh. He wonders, not for the first time, if this is how human parents feel, and if so, how the hell humans have continued to beget future generations for the sake of continuity. Oxytocin, mostly. Hormones. They’re a hell of a thing. 

The hangar door opens. “Hey, it sounds like you guys are having a good time in here.” Proto does not see the speaker, not with his view blocked by the Tachikoma he’s working for, but he knows that voice, that casual friendliness, that light, springy step that belies a dense, powerful cyborg body. It’s Batou, one of the few other people at Section 9 who can tell the Tachikomas apart by sight and mannerism. 

“Mr. Batou.” The Tachikomas stop their chatter and turn, straightening up a little, like schoolchildren rearranging themselves at their desks now that the teacher has entered the classroom. 

“You aren’t up to your usual mischief, are you?” And that would be Togusa. The least artificial operator in Section 9, he happens also to understand the Tachikomas least. Proto has a working theory on that, that it’s easier for heavily cyberized individuals such as Batou to empathize with the Tachikomas and their artificial nature. Togusa, as a mostly-organic individual, sees them as Other, and not a possible mirror to his sapience. Proto wonders, not for the first time, how Togusa would see him, if he knew the truth, and feels a little wistful, in his usual muted way. 

One of the Tachikomas objects. “You’re hurting our feelings, Mr. Togusa. Mischief — as if! For your information, we were delving into the Individual Eleven matter in our own little way.”

Proto has always admired Togusa’s courage and his ability to overcome the raw physical and mental deficits he faces in fighting cyberized opponents. It’s something he can’t rightly quantify. Such feats would be impossible in a purely mechanistic universe. Perhaps it's the human spirit. The Ghost. Proto continues to listen as he finishes reloading the Tachikoma’s ammunition pod with a fresh belt of ammo. 

The Tachikomas begin their little show-and-tell conference, with Batou and Togusa as their audience. The techs, junior and senior, are just part of the hangar. Incidental. “You can’t even develop a vaccine for the virus Mr. Borma found because no-one’s been able to pinpoint the factor that triggers it, right?” one of the other Tachikomas asks. 

“Uh, that’s certainly true. You’re correct,” Batou concedes. 

“Darn right I am!” it chirps. “So we tried searching through the data the police have for anything relevant.”

“Look at this!” One of the others waves at the monitor of the diagnostic terminal, now used to display the relevant information. “We checked out the eleven people who killed themselves.”

The display scrolls through the dossiers of the dead men. “It appears they shared a lot in common, including the types of jobs they had. Former military officers, policemen, and even mercenaries. Another point that can’t be ignored is that each man’s prosthetic level is over 50%.” 

“And aside from that,” yet another one says, waving its claw, “isn’t the number of virus carriers estimated to be somewhere in the range of 20,000? We’re talking about a potential epidemic here. If we don’t hurry up and create a vaccine, no one can guarantee that there won’t be any more victims, like that reporter Mr. Togusa met.”

No, Proto thinks, reclaiming his previous thread of thought, it’s Batou who is the Tachikomas’ collective father figure. Proto is more akin to a day-care teacher, and his strictness with the Tachikomas is largely because he feels that at least _one_ of the AIs here has to behave like an adult. Which is wholly illogical of him, given that their combined operational lifespan is several times that of his. He ought to be the child here, if they’re going by chronological age. But that is too simplistic a yardstick by which to gauge maturity. And besides, children require authority figures to bump up against, so they learn the value of boundaries during their explorations. Boundaries are there to mark out what is safe, and what is unsafe. To separate home from wilderness. To delineate comfort zones. That’s part of why Proto exists. 

“Let somebody else deal with this,” Batou says. “It’s not your job.” 

“Aww, but —” the Tachikomas begin to protest.

Batou cuts them off. “And we’ve already asked for SPring-8 to handle the examination of the dead Individual Eleven members.”

“Woohoo!” they cheer. They do love the particle research that goes on at SPring-8. Proto has known them to spend hours poring over research papers when intrigued. It’s something he’s done himself, in his free time. They all have the same underlying neural circuitry, after all. 

“Yeah, I figured that would interest you. That’s why we’re on our way out there now, to meet up with the Major. And speaking of the Devil, that reminds me. The Major said to bring one of you with us. Who wants to go?” 

The Tachikomas begin to clamor like excited school kids, waving their manipulator arms to get Batou’s attention, but he settles the hangar down almost immediately. “But if you haven’t had your maintenance check yet, I’m afraid I can’t take any of you.”

“Me! Me! Over here! I’m all done with my maintenance!” The Tachikoma that Proto has been working on all morning steps out of the maintenance bay just as he finishes putting the cables away. Proto lets out a sound of surprise — they’re not quite done yet. 

“You say that you’re ready, huh?” Batou grins. The bright lights of the hangar flash off his prosthetic eyes, winking off the lenses. “Okay. Let’s go.”

“Yes, sir!” it chirps brightly, the massive thump of its feet a contrast to the lightness of its behavior. 

“Oh. It’s his personal unit,” Togusa murmurs, turning to leave. 

“Hey —” Proto makes an attempt at catching the Tachikoma’s attention. They both know they’re not actually done yet. 

It chooses to ignore him, like a child sticking its tongue out in cheerful defiance. “Hey, guys, wait up, will you?” it cries, as it trundles out the door in Batou and Togusa’s wake.

“It looks like somebody is Mr. Batou’s pet,” one of the remaining eight tanks says. 

“What’s going on?” Proto asks no-one in particular. “I haven’t given it any oil yet.” He glances at the bottle of synthetic oil in his hand, mentally closes that particular Tachikoma’s maintenance file, noting down the tasks he needs to complete later. It’ll live, and so will he. Tachikomas are war machines, after all, and they’re not going to collapse after an incomplete maintenance session or two. At least he got the worn LMG barrel changed out. The old one had been nearing the end of its operational life. 

“It’s strange,” one of the other Tachikomas says. “We haven’t been given natural oil since we got these new bodies. So why do you suppose that one retains the position of Mr. Batou’s personal unit?”

“Not only that,” another one pipes up, “I get the impression that the differentiation in our individuality is even stronger than before.” 

“Hey, Proto, why do you think that is, huh?” a third one asks. 

“That’s a question that I can’t answer,” Proto says, as he begins working on the next Tachkoma in line. He means it in all the ways one could interpret that sentence. “Maybe it’s due to the fact that we set up a main server for the Tachikomas and then reprogrammed you with the ability to keep individual information separate from one another.” 

In truth Proto knows more about the Tachikomas’ cognition than anyone except perhaps their creator, Dr. Asuda. That’s because he has all of Dr. Asuda’s monographs and research findings stored in his external memory, and Major Kusanagi’s reports besides. None of his superiors know this, except for the Major and Chief Aramaki, of course, and that’s only because they were the people who commissioned Proto’s creation in the first place. It’s just that the raw data, impressive as it is, doesn’t explain everything when it comes to the Tachikomas and their emergent personalities and individuality. The Major hasn’t definitively concluded whether they have Ghosts, and neither has Proto.

The head tech takes pity on Proto, standing in the middle of the hangar while the Tachikomas chatter among themselves. “Now listen,” he says, “You’d better start behaving yourselves, otherwise we’ll never finish up here.”

One of the Tachikomas signals to the others, banging its manipulator against the dome that serves as its head, and seven of them go limp while an eighth waits patiently in the maintenance bay. They’re going to confer among themselves in cyberspace, which is rather convenient for them and the techs who are stuck listening to them. They’re not limited by the slow bandwidth of verbal speech there. 

Of course, Proto thinks, as he begins his check on this Tachikoma’s diagnostics, given that his own cognition is based on Dr. Asuda’s neurochip, his doubts about whether the Tachikomas have Ghosts would extend also to his own nature. It’s something he’s lain awake thinking of in idle cycles, at night, when humans sleep, and he’s never come to a satisfactory answer. If Proto were more given to anxiety and worry, the question of whether he had a Ghost would have probably triggered some kind of existential crisis. But the question has never really worried him, per se. He’s curious about, yes, but not devastated by the lack of definite proof. It definitely is a good thing, he thinks, that he was programmed with a stable, phlegmatic personality. 

—

Proto is in a low mood near the close of the day. This is an unusual occurrence for him, and a quick search through his external memory confirms his initial suspicions, that he has never felt this depressed before. It’s something he notes, and logs. There’s a heaviness in his limbs that makes him feel miscalibrated — off, as though there is something affecting his sensory input, or the proprioception of his body’s boundaries. It’s unpleasant, but his internal diagnostics read as nominal, which tells him that this is a wholly emotional thing. 

And yet things are never wholly emotional for him. Unlike the Tachikomas, Proto is made partially up of biologic components, which are still vulnerable to the effects of prolonged stress, hence mandated rest hours where he lies in bed, his mind idle but active, as his body returns to equilibrium. In this respect he is rather closer to the organic end of the spectrum. He knows exactly why he feels depressed, too. 

Dr. Akio Asuda has been placed under arrest for attempting to defect. It’s not official news, but Proto has access to the Tachikomas’ shared cyberspace forum, and what they know, he knows. Unlike the Tachikomas, Proto was permitted to remember his meetings with Dr. Asuda, his father and creator. They had collaborated, under Major Kusanagi’s oversight, on the Tachikomas’ remote memory architecture. Those had been some of Proto’s first independent experiences, which meant that they informed a large part of his decision-making on a day-to-day basis. 

Proto understands Major Kusanagi’s decision to delete the memory of Dr. Asuda from the Tachikomas’ partitioned memory. Memory can affect emergent AI like a black hole does light, bending it unexpectedly with the gravity of its influence. He wonders if he’ll be allowed to keep his own memories of Dr. Asuda. The scientists maintaining his body and mind assess his psychology and cognition every time he goes in for a check-up and he’s always been fully aware that they could edit his memory and personality if necessary. They could already have, for all he knows. That has never bothered him until today. 

It’s because, Proto realizes, he values those memories of Dr. Asuda’s mentorship, and has thought himself fortunate to know the man who is in several senses his father and creator. This is the first time Proto has been confronted with the possibility that he may have to lose something he loves, hence the vague distress he feels. He pauses a moment and blinks, his hands stilling momentarily in the process of putting his tools away and checking them back in. 

Love. This is the first time he’s identified one of his emotions as love. Proto files that thought away for later follow-up when an alert comes on. Superimposed in his vision is a notification. Chief Aramaki is calling him. How unusual. “Sir,” Proto says, inwardly, after waiting for the momentary encryption handshake. 

“Proto,” Aramaki says, by way of greeting. “You haven’t left the HQ yet, have you?”

Proto does not even have to check the time. “No, sir. It’s not 5 PM yet.” 

“Good. I’d like to see you in my office before you leave.”

“Yes, sir.” 

—

It isn’t every day that the junior-most Tachikoma tech at Section 9 is requested to report to the Chief’s office, and Proto does so only after changing out of his grease-stained coveralls. The only on-site staff who know of his experimental nature are the Chief and Major Kusangi — his maintenance and psychological assessments are all done off-site for secrecy reasons, and that is what he assumes is the reason for this meeting. The hallways are empty this late in the day, save for the omnipresent Operators, lesser cousins of his, and he reaches Chief Aramaki’s office without any comment. 

“Chief,” Proto says, as he steps in the doorway. “You wanted to see me.”

“Yes,” Aramaki says, waving to a chair before his desk. “Sit. This is going to take more than a minute.”

“Yes, sir.” Proto sits in the chair facing Aramaki’s desk, and waits. 

“As you know,” Aramaki says without preamble, “we’re currently in the process of acquiring new recruits for Section 9.” That’s not something Proto actually knows. Recruitment and preferment are not anything he has a say in. He remains silent, and waits for the Chief to continue. “However, the current security situation may impede training and orientation of new field officers in the near future.” 

“Do you anticipate us being short-handed, sir?” Proto asks, after an appropriate pause. 

“I do. I also happen to know that you meet or exceed all qualifications for new Section 9 recruits.” 

That, of course, is because those were part of the specifications Proto had been built to, to be able to be promoted upwards if necessary. But it’s not his job to tell his superiors what they already know. “With the right control software, yes, sir,” he says instead.

Aramaki nods, more a selfward gesture of confirmation than anything else. “With that in mind, Proto, I’m authorizing your access for the appropriate software and data volumes. Familiarize yourself with the rules and regulations, standard operating procedures, everything. I’ll have you issued a sidearm as well. Keep it in your locker for now. You’ll continue to do your job as a tech for the time being, until I formally activate you as a field officer of Section 9. You will have range access. Take time out of your workday to train. If the head techs give you trouble about it, refer them to me.”

That’s a surprise. Aramaki is already approving Proto’s accesses as they speak, the new permission messages popping up in his vision one by one. The situation is clearly more desperate than Aramaki is willing to say outright. “Yes, sir,” Proto says, as he authorizes the new downloads to his memory, external and otherwise. 

“And Proto. You may have to accompany me into high places. I suggest you get measured for a suit. A good one.” And that isn’t a surprise. Chief Aramaki meets regularly with the Prime Minister and other members of her Cabinet. Any aides accompanying him would have to be dressed formally. 

“Yes, sir,” Proto says. “Is that all, sir?”

Aramaki hesitates briefly then. “No. I suppose you already know that Dr. Asuda has been arrested.” 

“Yes, sir,” Proto says. There is a vague sinking sensation in his gut that his diagnostics say is not actually there. He can anticipate where this is going. 

Aramaki nods again. “The Tachikomas told you, I take it.”

Proto nods. “In a manner of speaking. Chief —”

Aramaki sighs. “I don’t know yet what is going to happen to him, legally. We have some leeway, but not much. I’ve authorized an emergency systems check for you, just in case he may have left anything in your head that you don’t know about. Be there after work.”

“Yes, sir.” Proto rises from his chair, to take his leave. 

“That is all.” Aramaki dismisses him. 

He leaves. 

—

Proto walks out of the HQ, in his civilian clothing again. Khakis, a dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up. Dressed like this he looks like a young, low-ranking worker in the more casual echelons of Niihama City’s business class — a junior accountant or apprentice copywriter, just another person on the street. He could easily dress better with the salary he earns at Section 9, especially given the fact that, having sprung fully-formed into life a year and change ago, he has absolutely no debt and very few needs. His housing is allocated to him out of a gray budget somewhere, he spends most of his time at work, and his bank account is comfortably full. He has acquired most of his clothing via off-rack stores at this point, but that will not do. Chief Aramaki specified a “good” suit, and that means tailors. 

He takes a left turn out of the building’s front door instead of the right — another variation in his routine — walking against the stream of humanity headed for the entrance to the subway station. The laboratory where he receives his maintenance checks is one of several clinics in a building full of them — a dentist, a plastic surgeon’s office, an orthopedic specialist — and it’s well within walking distance of Section 9’s HQ. The rich golden glow of the setting sun paints the grimy buildings with temporary splendor, making the world match Proto’s own coloration for a brief, impossible time, and the light catches on his long eyelashes, warms his face as he brings up a list of tailors in the district, and then automatically calls each to see if they have an appointment available for this evening, or barring that, tomorrow, after five. 

Proto knows he is doing this as displacement activity, because it’s too easy to think of the possibilities that lie before him. There is no avoiding this emergency maintenance appointment, he knows, except by running away, at which point Chief Aramaki would be forced to regretfully classify him as rogue technology, at which point the Major or Batou or one of the other field officers would pay him a visit, and that would be it. And besides, the thought, even, of running in cowardice leaves a sense of distaste stirring in the pit of his belly, driving a very real spike of nausea through him. Such an act would be counter to every value programmed into his personality. 

Yet Proto feels his stride slowing as he approaches the clinic’s façade, and his breath hitches briefly in his chest as he pushes the heavy glass door open on its sprung hinges. A breath of cool air rushes out of the lobby and stirs his fine hair, blowing it off his shoulders as he steps over the threshold and lets the door swing shut behind him. It doesn’t matter, in the long run. If they delete his memories of Dr. Asuda, he will walk out of here without any sense of that loss. And if they don’t, then this worry was all for nothing. The thought banishes the weight from his limbs, and he lets out a low, cleansing sigh as he opens the inner door to the examination room. Things are what they are. 

“Good evening, Proto,” Shiori says as he enters the examination room. She is the junior-most of the technicians responsible for his maintenance and care, just as he is the junior-most technician in charge of the Tachikomas’ maintenance. The light winks off her glasses as she pulls a fresh sheet of paper over the examination table, and her hands seem too tanned and brown, almost, against the spotless white of her lab coat. 

Proto has actually never seen her entire face — everyone in this lab wears hair coverings and surgical masks when they work on him. It’s not really a security reason, he thinks, but rather because his biologic components require a higher level of sterility than inorganic ones do. He steps behind the wheeled screen folded helpfully out for him and strips swiftly and efficiently, without shame. “Good evening, Shiori,” Proto says belatedly in reply to her greeting, before he dons the paper gown they have placed behind the screen for modesty’s sake. The thin blue gown rustles and crinkles around him as he folds his garments neatly before emerging. Sawada’s has had a last-minute cancellation for a 7:30 PM slot, and the tailor’s assistants can fit Proto in then. His maintenance shouldn’t take much longer than 90 minutes, so he accepts with a thought, using his workname.

One of the other techs, Yosuke, helps Proto up onto the examination table, and he does not resist when Shiori turns his head gently to the side to access the cranial port at the nape of his neck. Her gloved fingers push locks of his pale hair aside, and there’s a faint clinging sensation as the cable jack clicks in place, accompanied by a phantom taste of metal in his mouth. Both those sensations fade swiftly. To his left is the clicking of a keyboard as Dr. Kanazawa begins to search through his diagnostic data. 

“Sorry for the short notice,” Shiori says, before she drags a soft blue blanket over his bare legs, tucking it up to his waist. 

“No,” Proto says, “I understand.” They don’t have to protect his dignity, really, because he has little to no nudity taboo, but the weight of the blanket is a little comforting at the present time, and he appreciates its softness and warmth.

“Well, we’re going to do a full maintenance pass today,” Shiori says from behind her mask, “instead of waiting the five days for your next appointment, so we can just move them all back two weeks. Unless that’d conflict with something else in your schedule, of course.” 

“No, not really,” Proto says. They don’t have to be nice about these appointments either, because his body is unable to repair itself without regular infusions of engineered cells. Without those infusions he would eventually fall apart, which is why he is also the sole prototype bioroid that he knows of in Niihama City, and possibly, Japan. He’s meant to be a proof of concept more than anything else, an initial demonstration of the technologies in question. This isn’t the world out of a child’s anime where prototype mecha turn out to be the superior machines. Progress requires iteration, after all. 

But they are nice about these maintenance appointments, and polite, and kind to him, despite the great power they hold over him. Dr. Kanazawa could, with the right set of keystrokes, alter the very core of who Proto is right now, and Proto would not be able to care after it had been done. Their kindness does not make that knowledge any more comfortable or easy to bear. Power requires no permission. But it does make lying there on that examination table a little more bearable. 

There’s the sharp smell of disinfectant in the air, an alcohol and iodine swab evaporating cool on the inside of Proto’s left forearm, where the infusion port is marked with a natural looking mole sculpted into his fair skin, and a brief cold discomfort as Yosuke slides a 16ga cannula into him. A bag of creamy white liquid hangs in the IV stand over the examination table, and a phantom warmth starts spreading through Proto’s veins as he is replenished with nano-corpuscles and engineered stem cells, all suspended in their own nutrient medium. A strip of surgical tape secures the cannula and IV tubing to his arm, and he registers its sticky pull barely as he lets himself drift into low power-use mode, his mind on idle. 

Proto keeps a timer up in the dark behind his eyelids and waits, wondering if he’ll feel it if Dr. Kanazawa erases his memories of Dr. Asuda. But that’s a silly thought, because he knows the Tachikomas don’t feel anything when they have information erased off their external memory, and neither will he. He keeps his eyes shut, and focuses only on the seconds ticking by, and then the minutes; counts the beats of his heart as well. 

58 minutes and 32 seconds have gone by when Proto senses the tape being pulled off his left arm, and the IV cannula being withdrawn. 2932 heartbeats, total. “Well, we’re done,” Yosuke says, and Proto opens his eyes, blinks once as the world resolves into focus. The IV bag isn’t empty yet, but this appointment was early, in any case, and Proto’s internal diagnostics readout tells him that he’s full up. 

“You’re good, Proto,” says Dr. Kanazawa from behind his console. “No sabotage, no hidden malware in your programming or memory, no major refits required, either.” 

“Thank you, Doctor.” Proto levers himself up on one elbow, and then the other, pushing himself to a sitting position, before he reaches up and pulls the interface plug out of the nape of his neck. There’s that odd metallic taste again, that sense-fragment, and now he’s himself, self-contained again, at least as self-contained as he can be while he’s still connected to cyberspace. There’s a vague, shaky sense of relief fluttering in Proto’s belly. At least Dr. Asuda hadn’t — Wait. He still has his memories of Dr. Asuda, and also the knowledge that he has those memories. He compares each of them to relevant files tagged in his external memory, to the research papers and code he associates with the man, and nothing has been pruned or blocked off. 

Proto blinks rapidly twice, and then pushes the blanket off his lap, to swing his bare feet onto the cold tile floor of the examination room. Shiori turns her face politely away as he does so, and he retreats back behind the screen to dress again. 

“We’ll see you again in two weeks. Same time?” Shiori asks him, as he buttons his shirt.

“Yes, that sounds good,” Proto says. He finishes tucking his shirt into the waistband of his khakis, fastens his belt, before he slides his feet into his shoes. 

“Goodbye, Proto,” Shiori says, as he pushes the door of the examination room open.

“Goodbye.” 

—

The golden sunset has turned ruddy outside in the time it took for Proto’s maintenance to complete, and he walks in a world of twilight blush as he figures out what to do in the time before his appointment at Sawada’s. He takes the walk at a leisurely pace as Niihama City’s residents jostle against him in the street, on their way home from work or to work, to dinner, to various forms of nightlife and entertainment and shopping, and he is again a single entity anonymous among myriad others. 

The city’s neon lights shroud its concrete and glass with color as the sunlight begins to fade, and the streetlamps come on one by one, automatically above him. This is Proto’s home — he has known no other — and for the moment he is content to simply abide. At his deliberate pace the walk to Niihama City’s garment district takes him 20 minutes, and all around him are fabric import warehouses, sellers of notions and sewing machines, tailors and dressmakers and couture workshops, and the businesses that serve the people who work in such places. Wedged between a dry cleaner’s and a haberdasher’s is a small, crowded ramen shop, and the fragrance of salt and umami wafting from its entrance draws Proto closer. 

Proto orders a large bowl of the spicy miso ramen and pays for it at the ticket stand, and waits for a spot to clear at one of the tiny tables. He sits down and passes the slip to an android server, and she returns shortly with his food. The bowl of ramen is steaming hot, topped with ground pork and sweet buttered corn, masses of shredded cabbage, green onion, and a soft-simmered boiled egg. Small, fragrant particles of roasted garlic float in little blobs of dark garlic oil on top of the broth and toppings. 

Proto tastes perfectly well. He just hasn’t had the decades of experience it takes most humans to build food preferences and aversions, and is therefore the opposite of a picky eater. He knows what tastes and smells good, though, and this bowl of noodles is both. Fragrant steam wafts against the skin of his face as he slurps mouthfuls of noodles hot enough to sting his tongue with both their heat and their spicy, nutty flavor. There is enough of a biological basis in his construction that the sensation of satiety comforts him, as his system begins to process the nutrients in his dinner.

Proto doesn’t linger over his meal — not when there are customers waiting for others to vacate their seats, but finishing it leaves him better able to confront the tail-end of his day, and he leaves the ramen shop with fresh reserves of energy. There is still a little time before his appointment with the tailor, and Proto uses it to window-shop in the garment district, glancing quietly into the lit windows at the goods on display. He has dressed plainly in the past because he has not had a pressing reason to spend more, not when he spends his entire workday in a set of mechanic’s coveralls. That does not mean that he has no idea what to wear when the situation demands it, not especially because his mind is still active and connected to cyberspace while his body lies resting in bed. 

Many of those idle hours have been spent on research and reading for the sheer pleasure of it, which makes sense, as Proto’s cognition is largely identical to that of the Tachikomas, just with a more mature, constrained personality laid over it, and his sense of curiosity is as insatiable as theirs. He just happens to have a broader set of built-in boundaries imposed upon him, and a greater sense of caution due to his more fragile construction. Moreover, he was created to live in human society, and therefore subjects that would be largely irrelevant to a Tachikoma, such as food or fashion, are closely intertwined with his own existence. 

In summation, there are things he has always wanted to wear, and it is quite fortunate that his impending promotion to field officer has afforded him a brand new opportunity to have a suit tailored. No, “fortunate”, he thinks, is not quite the right word to use. No, “exciting” would be a better choice.

—

There are only two people in Sawada’s when Proto steps through the door shortly before 7:30 PM, his senses registering the smell of tailor’s chalk and the faint distinct smell of lanolin and wet wool under detergents and chemical dyes. One of them, an older man, does not look up from his work. The other, a young apprentice, from the look of him, is already waiting. 

“Good evening and welcome,” the younger man says, with a formal bow, “Mr. Iwasaki?”

Proto returns the bow with equal formality. “Yes. Good evening.” He is not an established customer here yet, and a novice at the sartorial arts. There is no reason for him to presume superiority, even towards a tailor’s apprentice. 

“If you’ll please come this way, I’ll start the measuring process. Mr. Sawada will be with us shortly. My name is Takumi, please tell me if you need anything while you’re here.” Proto is escorted to a narrow room just a bit larger than a changing booth, with good lighting from the fixture above. A low wooden box stands in one corner, its top scuffed with the pressure of many feet. 

Takumi holds no tape measure. Apparently Mr. Sawada measures his clients himself. No, Takumi’s purpose here is to watch, learn and observe, and record. Proto lifts and lowers his arms obediently as his chest measurement is taken, has his long hair lifted lightly off his shoulders so they can get the width of his shoulders and the circumference of his neck, the length of his center back. 

All through the process Takumi repeats the measurements that Mr. Sawada reads out to him, before he writes them down on a fit form on a clipboard. How archaic, Proto thinks, but even now in 2032 a bespoke and handmade suit is still the standard of highest formality. They could have just put him in a laser-assisted measuring booth, but a machine’s time is cheap, and being able to afford an artisan’s time, along with the tiny human irregularities of their workmanship, is still a marker of luxury. 

Proto gets his waist and inseam measured, the circumference of his narrow hips and thighs and knees, by Mr. Sawada’s light, professional hands, but Takumi’s gaze lingers on his face a little more than is strictly necessary. It’s not very obvious — most humans would have missed it, because of how subtle it is. Proto only notices the faint deviations from typical because his sense of time is more keenly attuned than that of most other people. He is being checked out, but subtly so. 

Mr. Sawada retreats into the workshop section of the tailors’ shop after the measuring session, and Proto is left alone in the front end of the store with Takumi, who begins laying bolts of fine wool fabric out on one of the empty tables. High-quality fabric in varying weights, made in mills in England and Italy from fine Australian wool. Pinstripe, check, and solids, in various somber colors. 

“Is there anything here that appeals to you?” Takumi asks him, as Proto begins to peruse the selection of cloth, his fingertips brushing lightly over each. “We have more stock on the shelves here and in the back, if none of this pleases you.” 

“I like this one,” Proto says, indicating a soft wool flannel in a rich dark chocolate brown. He hesitates over the others, exploring them by touch and by gaze, and then points to another bolt further to the left. “That one, too.” It’s a lighter, less textured fabric in a fine brown glen plaid, the dark lines intersected by checks of white. 

“Very good, sir,” Takumi says. The rejected bolts of fabric go back up on the shelves while Proto waits, and now bolts of silk and rayon are laid extravagantly near the wools he has chosen for side-by-side comparison, various linings for coat and waistcoat and sleeve. Out of those Proto chooses a violet rayon polka-dotted with gold, and a pale yellow silk the color of lemon curd for suit linings, and a Bemberg rayon in blue, yellow and brown stripes to line his coat sleeves. Takumi notes each of Proto’s selections meticulously on the order form on his clipboard, jotting the stock numbers down in the relevant entries.

“Do you have any style requests for us, Mr. Iwasaki?” Takumi asks him, after he has finished returning the fabric to stock. An array of buttons and buckles lies spread out on the table now, each sewn or secured to sheets of card taken from a bulky document binder. 

“That dark brown horn, for the chocolate brown, I think,” Proto says, after a few moments of assessment, “and the coffee-brown corozo for the glen plaid. And —” he hesitates again, looking through an internal folder of images he has saved for inspiration, “Gold-tone buckles for the waistcoats. Nothing too extravagant for the cut or the lines of the suits. I don’t want to look too much better-dressed than my boss or colleagues, or more formal than they.” 

Takumi seems to be leaning minutely, incrementally forward with each decision Proto makes, at once approving and — Proto guesses more than knows — infatuated with his sense of style. This close to the seat of government, Sawada’s must get many well-heeled customers who don’t really care what they wear as long as it’s expensive and luxurious enough to convey their status, without restraint. Takumi must have spent many a day watching men make tacky, expensive choices while biting back the urge to judge outwardly. 

“On the formality thing,” Takumi says, slightly forward for an apprentice, “I might suggest patch pockets. Maybe not on the glen plaid, where it’d stand out too much, but on the flannel. They used to be something you only saw on country tailoring, for people who had rural estates, but they’re a slightly more casual option than the typical welted pocket. Also a little bit less of a pain in the ass to sew, just between you and me.” 

“Yes,” Proto muses, after a few seconds of thought. “Yes, patch pockets for the dark brown suit.” 

Takumi pauses, glancing over his glasses at Proto with an expression that is clearly more than professional. “You’ll probably also want shirts and ties to match the quality of these suits, when you start wearing them,” he says after a second’s pause. “It would probably be best if you got measured for the shirts in the next month, so they’ll be ready for you to collect by the time we’re done. Saves you another wait.” He scrawls something down on a name card he takes from a holder behind the counter, and slides it across the glass to Proto, who picks it up. 

The card is plain heavy cardstock, creamy pale, printed with the name, address and number of a shirtmaker’s and haberdasher’s a block down from Sawada’s, but written on its unmarked back is Takumi’s name and personal phone number. _Call me,_ the note says. Proto pockets the card without any further comment. He leaves Sawada’s with an appointment for his first fitting in two weeks. He’ll probably have two more fittings after that, and it’ll be anything from six weeks to eight before his completed suits are delivered. 

Proto has spent less than an hour at Sawada’s, all told, but he decides to call the haberdasher’s tomorrow instead of trying for a walk-in this late. Instead he walks slowly back towards the subway station, taking a different route out of the garment district instead of the one he took in. The garment district is broad enough that the parallel route Proto takes brings him through streets lined with other kinds of clothing shops. Proto’s pale reflection follows him, washed-out in the low light, in the unlighted windows of closed shops as he walks down the street. A bridal dressmakers’, with a selection of gowns and wedding kimono, a lingerie shop, its mannequins festooned with confections of silk and lace, a sewing machine store, its display crammed with infrequently-dusted industrial machines and steam irons. 

This is not the first time someone has hit on Proto, nor the first time he has been hit on by someone of his gender. He was created to be beautiful, after all, and his features appeal to many humans, straight, gay, or bisexual. He is also no child, despite his brief life so far, and his constant access to cyberspace has left him well-educated on the foibles of human behavior, romantic and otherwise. So this latest attempt does not bother him at all. 

It’s easier, Proto guesses, when it’s a man flirting with him, because it’s more common to assume that his quiet rejections are because he’s heterosexual, instead of being taken as a potential insult. It’s a dishonest assumption, however, because Proto frankly has no idea what his own sexuality is. It’s not that he’s entirely sexless, like a steer or a Hebraic angel — quite the contrary. His body is fully anatomically correct and quite capable of performing sexually, should he ever need those functions, and he has been programmed to feel pleasure and arousal should he ever partake. 

He just doesn’t feel as though he is in a stage of his life where he’s ready to explore those aspects yet. He is, he supposes, latently sexual, like a preadolescent, rather than completely devoid of feelings of attraction, and therefore those attempts at flirting aimed in his direction go unanswered, because he is not yet ready to respond. They are flattering, however, and as an entity he is not wholly immune to the effects of flattery. In fact, he fully acknowledges, he is just a tiny bit vain, proud of how he looks, despite the fact that his fine features are something he was given unearned and unasked for. 

The rest of Proto’s evening goes by, consumed largely by his assimilation and study of the software and information that Chief Aramaki has authorized for his use, and he crawls into bed that night, his mind buzzing with regulations and procedures to familiarize himself with. He’ll be largely done with the bureaucratic stuff by the time his alarm goes off tomorrow morning. The control software will take a little longer for him to work into his programmed reflexes, at least until frequent practice reinforces those new commands in the way he accesses his memory. 

—

Two weeks go by, and two more, and six weeks and two days have elapsed since that afternoon Proto found out that Dr. Asuda had tried to defect. He has come into work early this morning on Chief Aramaki’s orders, to collect the sidearm he keeps in his secure employee locker. He has just finished putting his coat back on over his shoulder holster when he hears and feels the heavy thud of footfalls from some distance away. 

It can only be a Tachikoma, from the sheer mass behind each step, and Proto turns slowly after he shuts his locker door, to spy one of the blue-painted tanks peeking at him around the corner. “Yes?” he asks it. 

“Wow. I like your new suit, Proto,” it says, one three-lensed eye swiveling around to scan him, from head to toe and head again. “You look nice.”

“Thank you,” Proto says with genuine pleasure. “Is that what you came all the way here for?” 

“No, no!” it says, waving a claw in protest. “The others want to see you too! We all have something to say to you.” 

“I have to see the Chief, you know,” Proto says, gently warning. It wouldn’t do to be late, his first day as a field officer. 

The Tachikoma’s eye swivels and rolls in exasperation. “It won’t be long, I promise. You have to come to the hangar!”

Proto senses that he’s not being given much of a choice here. He can go peacefully, or he’ll wind up getting dragged in by the arm, and this suit is too new to damage. “All right,” he says after a second’s pause. “Lead on.” 

None of the other techs have arrived yet, this early in the morning, and therefore it is just AIs in the hangar when he arrives — the Tachikomas, and him. He can hear their childish, excited conversation before he even rounds the corner, and there’s a sudden fanfare of cheering and clicky applause as the door slides open. 

“Congratulations on your new promotion, Proto!” The Tachikomas are all waving little paper streamers in their manipulator claws, and a smile of joy and disbelief breaks out onto Proto’s face as he takes the scene in — each of the eight other Tachikomas waiting for him in the hangar is sporting a necktie knotted neatly onto the antenna over its head. 

“I —” Words are insufficient to express how he feels, and so he straightens solemnly and gives them a deep, formal bow, one colleague to another. “Thank you all very much, for your kind wishes.” 

There’s a little collective cheer, and then one of the Tachikomas, the one with the shallow dent in its cowling, pipes up. “Now before we let you report to the Chief, Proto, we have something to fix.”

“Yeah!” another one cries, “Your necktie is all crooked. It’s a disgrace!” 

“Fortunately Mr. Batou taught me, his favorite, how to tie a necktie yesterday.”

“And we’ve been practicing all night on each other!” 

“Let me tie your necktie for you, Proto! I promise I’ll do it right.”

Most people would feel significant trepidation putting their neck within reach of a Tachikoma’s powerful metal claws, but Proto knows the exact tolerances of their collective grips, and fears them not. He loosens his necktie, reversing the steps of the four-in hand knot, before he slips it free from the stiff interlined collar of his new shirt, and then hands it over to Batou’s pet Tachikoma. Another pair of claws straightens his shirt collar then, folding it up, and the smooth length of silk is draped gently over his shoulders. 

Proto collects the length of his hair in his right hand, sweeping it aside to clear the loop of the necktie’s length, and then the Tachikomas begin to pipe up. “Now what necktie knot should we do first? I mean, everyone does the four-in-hand here, but we could do a half-Windsor.” 

“No, no, the Shelby knot!” a dissenter argues, “Proto would look fantastic with a Shelby knot!” 

“Make sure you leave a nice dimple in the tie, whatever you do! That’s what makes it look the most stylish.” 

He is ten minutes late to meeting Chief Aramaki that morning, but his necktie knot has never looked better. 

— 

It's sunset, or just a little bit after it, and the Chief and Togusa have left the office to coordinate their actions with Prime Minister Kayabuki. Proto is alone, propped up still against a desk, and cyberspace is empty. His shirt collar is stiff with blood, not the rust and crimson of human blood, but the pale stuff that runs in his veins instead. He can taste it, heavy, cloying, salty-sweet as it runs down the back of his throat from a hemorrhage somewhere in his skull, and at this point he no longer possesses the strength or muscle control to swallow it as it fills his mouth.

Instead, he lets it trickle down his chin, to sully the perfect necktie knot that Batou’s Tachikoma tied for him that very morning, and it coagulates in slick globs down his chest. This is the end of all things, at least for him, and for them. The Tachikomas have neutralized a nuclear missile by crashing a satellite into it, saving millions of lives at the cost of their own existences as entities. Their hardware is probably still here in Niihama City, but they will never greet Batou again, nor bribe the techs with pastries, nor help Proto tie his necktie again. 

Not that Proto will need his necktie tied for very much longer. He has been ignoring the warnings in his visual field for a while now, but there is nothing else to do while he sits, paralyzed in this room, and waits. Critical systems damage. Energy critically low. Control connection lost. Trying again… 0%. The attack barrier he had run into would have killed a human hacker instantly, and it’s only a quirk of his synthetic nature that he has managed to hold out this long, to keep reporting to Chief Aramaki. 

It’s getting hard to breathe, propped up like this, and Proto tries to move his body, manages an undignified twitch after mustering what remains of his will. That’s enough to provoke a slide against the smooth veneer of the desk, and he slumps bonelessly onto his side, his face pressed against the rough green carpet. It’s the only thing he can feel besides the growing agony in his head and the shortness of breath — he’s been numb from the neck down since he was stricken hours ago. His injuries, he guesses, are analogous to a catastrophic fracture of the C3 and C4 vertebrae in a human being, with associated spinal compromise. It is becoming harder for him to breathe not just because he is nearly out of reserves, but also because a lesion in the spinal cord this high in the neck paralyzes many of the muscles involved in breathing. He is rapidly decompensating. Or, as a layman would say it, dying. 

Proto feels little to no bitterness that Chief Aramaki and Togusa have left him to die alone in this empty office. Their duty to the nation is more important than his own life, unique though it is. And he is not afraid to die, although the pain and discomfort are wringing tears out of his eyes. The Tachikomas were not afraid to die, and had been singing to the last. 

How did that song go, again? 

_We’re all alive, every last one of us, and we can feel sad ‘cause we’re alive  
When we hold our hands up to the sun and peek through our fingers  
We can see the deep red blood flowing inside!_

_Even earthworms, even crickets, even water striders  
We’re all alive, every last one of us, and we’re all friends! ___

____

____

Proto is sure now that the Tachikomas have Ghosts. Had. And since his cognition is based on theirs, then he, too, would have one. And that is a precious fact to hold on to, that comforts him in the pain and distress of his prolonged dying, even if it lessens his chances of returning intact from backup, should Section 9 opt to do so. It is what it is. 

_We’re all alive, every last one of us, and we can laugh ‘cause we’re alive  
We’re all alive, every last one of us, and we can feel happy ‘cause we’re alive!  
When we hold our hands up to the sun and peek through our fingers  
We can see the deep red blood flowing inside!_

_Even dragonflies, even frogs, even honey bees  
We’re all alive, every last one of us, and we’re all — _

“— Friends,” Proto whispers, on a last, rattling exhalation. 

Darkness. 

Silence. 

And above his still form, the sound of gunfire and breaking glass.

**Author's Note:**

> Note: They all live, according to the very end of Episode 26 and the Solid State Society movie. Well, come back from the dead, I guess, since the Tachikomas are hiding out in cyberspace, and Proto gets repaired (one assumes) and gets promoted up to field officer in SSS.


End file.
